Margrethe Vestager Quotes

I have a very strong tool in competitional enforcement: To do merger control, to look into cartels, misuse of dominant position - when member states hand out favors, for instance, in terms of tax breaks. But even though that's a strong tool, it cannot solve everything.

I have the most profound respect for the Department of Justice and the FTC. We in Europe are a younger and I would say junior institution to the historical antitrust experience of the US.

Like other antitrust agencies we make our assessment of a merger or antitrust case based on its impact on our jurisdiction, and not on the nationality of the companies. This is exactly what the U.S. antitrust agencies, the Justice Department and the FTC, do.

All the authorities agree that in order to vitiate a contract or combination it is not essential that its result should be a complete monopoly; it is sufficient if it really tends to that end and to deprive the public of the advantages which flow from free competition.

Practicing antitrust lawyers and government antitrust lawyers are a kind of priesthood spinning ever more gossamer refinements of the antitrust commandments.

If you can't compete fairly, honestly, effectively, no government should intervene. Now, some governments do. They prop up failing industries.

Consumers depend on us to make sure that competition is fair and open, and it's my responsibility to make that happen.

I think we need to have stronger antitrust enforcement.

I'm for strong antitrust enforcement.

The concept of free competition enforced by law is a grotesque contradiction in terms.

My current goal is to change the way we think about antitrust and anti-monopoly.

Amazon is not a monopoly or a monopsony, and even if it were, that by itself isn't illegal.

Antitrust law isn't about protecting competing businesses from each other, it's about protecting competition itself on behalf of the public.

The one thing that I know government is good for is countervailing against monopoly. It's not great at that either, but it's the only force I know that is fairly reliable.

Vigilant and effective antitrust enforcement today is preferable to the heavy hand of government regulation of the Internet tomorrow.

Our role is to maintain and monitor a framework in which fair competition can flourish.

The standard formulation on remedy is that it ought to cure past violations and prevent their recurrence. That's what antitrust is all about.

As someone with a deep faith in competition and the market, I also know that markets only work with tough enforcement of the rules that guarantee competition and fair play - and that the pressure to break those rules only gets stronger as the amount of money involved gets larger.

Everybody agrees that you want competition. But you have to have rules of fair competition if you want to have competitors to enter the market.

Unfair methods of competition in commerce are hereby declared unlawful. The commission is hereby empowered and directed to prevent persons, partnerships, or corporations, except banks, and common carriers subject to the Acts to regulate commerce, from using unfair methods of competition in commerce.

In this country in colonial days the laws were very strict against combinations and contracts in restraint of trade. But here again there was a gradual amelioration of the laws, until co-operation was permitted along many lines, including division of territory, limitation of output, and even fixing of prices; provided always that, as a result of the co-operation, the combinations or contracts did not result in monopoly, were not general, were not immoral, and were not contrary to public policy.

Free competition and the open market system as they were known in the old days, have lost their places in the system, and that the only substitute for them, in these modern times, is government regulation and control.

The only way you can stop the unregulated monopoly ... from gouging ... is to introduce competition.

The Sherman Act was designed to be a comprehensive charter of economic liberty aimed at preserving free and unfettered competition as the rule of trade. It rests on the premise that the unrestrained interaction of competitive forces will yield the best allocation of our economic resources, the lowest prices, the highest quality and the greatest material progress, while at the same time providing an environment conducive to the preservation of our democratic political and social institutions.

Possible economies cannot be used as a defense to illegality. Congress was aware that some mergers which lessen competition may also result in economies but it struck the balance in favor of protecting competition.